Bengaluru: Former IAS officer Sakleshpur Vishwesraiya Ranganath, who has taken over as interim chairman of Coffee Day Enterprises in the wake of founder V.G. Siddhartha’s death, is by popular opinion the best man for the job.
Just mention Ranganath, one of the longest-serving chief secretaries of Karnataka, and his colleagues as well as bosses begin sharing warm recollections of a simple man known for his honesty and commitment: A man never swayed by the trappings of power, a man who is pure heart.
Speaking to ThePrint, a senior journalist recalled an incident dating back to the latter’s tenure as principal secretary to the then chief minister S.M. Krishna (1999-2004).
It was a Saturday morning, the journalist said, when he spotted Ranganath waiting by the road for an auto, a bag of vegetables in one hand, with his young son tugging at the other.
“When asked why he did not use his official car, he replied, ‘My driver also needs an off. They work for the government not me’,” said the journalist.
As luck would have it, the journalist added, they saw a police constable just a short distance away carrying a bag of vegetables into an official government car, followed by the wife of an IPS officer. Ranganath saw this and just smiled, the journalist recalled.
An obvious choice
The CCD board appointed Ranganath the interim chairman on 31 July.
He was the obvious choice to lead the Cafe Coffee Day (CCD) team, said insiders, as not only does he have in-depth knowledge of the coffee industry owing to his stint as the Coffee Board of India chairman, his administrative capabilities are expected to revive a company left struggling after the sudden death of its founder last month.
An IAS officer of the 1975 batch, Ranganath took up civil services after acquiring a postgraduate degree in chemistry.
Ranganath has served as chief secretary under an unprecedented six chief ministers, the last stint culminating with his retirement in October 2013.
When he was appointed chief secretary, he superseded eight seniors. However, insiders said his characteristics of being incorruptible and respectable allowed him to remain in the post without being opposed.
From 2014 to 2017, he served as the non-executive chairperson of the Industrial Finance Corporation of India, and was appointed to the CCD board in 2015.
Even so, his contemporaries and friends from his IAS days often joke that he has hardly served outside Vidhana Soudha, the state assembly, because he was the first choice of every Karnataka chief minister, from Ramakrishna Hegde (who served three short stints in the 1980s) to B.S. Yediyurappa (2008-2011).
Former Union minister Veerappa Moily, who served as Karnataka chief minister from 1992 to 1994, said he made sure Ranganath was there to assist him as he was “a very good administrator with integrity and efficiency”.
“Together, we took some major decisions and introduced many programmes that helped rural India and he was very committed to his job,” Moily told ThePrint.
“He has a rare quality of being good with numbers. If you need to know about any particular file, he does not need anything but his brain ,” Moily added.
His mind is like blotting paper, said Jayakar Jerome, a retired senior IAS officer who worked closely with Ranganath.
“He would rattle off the names and dates of a particular file if you just mentioned the issue it dealt with,” he added, “Scrupulously honest and kind to a fault, and that’s the problem with that man.”
Explaining why he thought his dedication was a problem, Jerome recalled an incident where he found Ranganath working away in office even as his son was in hospital for a serious illness.
“When asked why he was not at the hospital, he replied that he did not have much to do there, and would rather sit here and help other people in distress,” Jerome added.
Another colleague, senior IAS officer Rakesh Singh, said he would give Ranganath 10/10 for integrity, 10/10 for hard work, 10/10 for sincerity and 20/10 for his memory.
“If we had a few hundred Ranganaths in this country today, we would have been in a much better place,” Singh, a close friend of his, told this reporter..
A secret talent
His sharp memory skills also made him indomitable at bridge, a card game, a talent Ranganath has only disclosed to a close circuit of friends. The game, his friends joke, helped him further sharpen his memory skills and stay alert at work.
Former Lokayukta Santosh Hegde said there could not have been a better choice than Ranganath to head CCD as he will always keep the interest of employees and shareholders in mind.
“According to me, in Siddhartha’s tragic death, a lot of things have been blamed on the government. Ranganath has been a bureaucrat and, having served on the CCD board, he will understand how the government works and help the company overcome their economic situation,” he added.
Also read: What CCD founder Siddhartha’s suicide shows – India can’t become $5 trillion economy this way
An earlier version of the report misattributed the account of the incident involving Ranganath waiting for an autorickshaw. The error has been corrected.
So much heard of Mr rangathan IAS, hats off to you sir, Jesus Christ loves you and cares for you, my prayers and thoughts are with you. God bless you 🙏😇😇😇.
But this Efficient, good and honest person failed as IFCI chairman.